Matthew Fertel 🖼️​​"

Duck & Cover #

Hipster Aliens #

Artist’s Statement #

My work focuses on exposing the unseen beauty in the everyday objects we all encounter in our daily lives. Passing by the same locations over days, months, and years, I photograph my subjects under different lighting and weather conditions, capturing the changes that occur as the environment interacts with them over time. Small details get framed in ways that draw attention away from the actual object and focus on the shapes, textures, and colors, transforming them into abstract landscapes, figures, and faces. I aim to use these out-of-context images to create compositions that encourage an implied narrative easily influenced by the viewer and open to multiple interpretations.

Duck And Cover is from a series of images called Waste Management, which consists of compositions created from details of dumpsters, trash cans and other refuse/recycling/green waste receptacles. I first came across this 55-gallon steel drum trash can on a bike ride along the American River Parkway in July of 2023. I revisit it every few months to see what new features the elements and vandals have contributed to it. This image is from May of this year.

Hipster Aliens is from a series of images called From The Scrap Heap, which consists of compositions created from piles of scrap and donated metal that is used for welding practice by students at Sierra College. This image was created from the remains of a welding booth that was decommissioned early this year and cut up for scrap and disposal.

Both were captured with an older iPhone, my current creative tool of choice. Accepting its “limitations”, I have learned what to expect from it under different conditions and how to take advantage of what it has to offer. I shoot full-frame with little or no cropping to maintain high resolution for printing. Basic editing is done post-capture. No filters or effects are used.

About the Artist #

Matthew Fertel is a Sacramento-based photographer who has worked at Sierra College since 2004. Before that, he was a fine art auction house catalog photographer in San Francisco for over ten years. Find him online at mfertel.wixsite.com and on Instagram @digprod4.